I went to the mill for a night this weekend and found several albums of Emerson family photographs I hadn't seen before. The photos of my Aunt Betsy made my throat go lumpy. She died when she was 27 26 and my mom was 25, which is really hard for me to wrap my brain around what that means in reality.

She was my mom's best friend. Since now my mom is my best friend, do you think that it means Betsy and I would somehow mystically be best friends by association? I console myself by thinking thus.

Love is all in your family - whoever it is shared by. Someone once told me nieces and aunts share a special bond... many share similar qualities. I know my aunt and I do. And I'm sure you do so with Betsy.

Wow...those photos are haunting. I often contemplate what I am missing in my life with several special ones who died before I was born. It's a classic "what-if" that never gets old and never finds an easy answer.

This confirms my belief that photographs and video are THE MOST important thing in life, as "things" go. They are the only way to actually preserve what was. To be able to see and hear people that we will never see or hear in life again. Amazing. I don't think I will ever get over how amazing that is.

Photos are a time machine. Sometimes a memory lane to good places or very painful spaces. Photo's can be brutually honest yet they at times only show the surface and hide the truth. Your photographs always hint at the essence of what is, as well as your text.

For me, looking at Aunt Betsy makes me think of what could have been. It also elevates her to the realm of expansive imagination. Where is she? What does she know that we don;t? What would she tell us if she could? What is death? What is the meaning of life?She can teach us to cherish this gift of life, of family and friends....despite the pain of love and loss.

Death has the power to destroy those left behind or empower us. It is the ultimate teacher.

The best of Betsy lives on....She lives on through your mother and through you.

As Einstein would say: "Matter can't be created nor destroyed." She was. She is. She will be.

Aunt Betsy would have admired you greatly and would be honored to be your friend.

i keep thinking about betsy and coming back to this post. betsy, so unadorned and feminine in her joni mitchell coltishness, her unselfconscious toothiness, her breezy hippie beauty, kneeling in the garden in the sunshine all those years ago.